Back in October, Ron Iddles, a former homicide detective and current police union secretary, claimed that Victoria’s crime wave was the worst in half a century:
Mr Iddles can’t think of another time when crime in his home state was worse.
He pointed to problems with ice, the contemporary issue of carjackings and home invasions and “regular” assaults on police…
He said Victoria needed more police officers, better technology and to look at methods used in NSW and other jurisdictions.
The claim came amid numerous reports of a wave of assaults by Melbourne’s notorious Apex Gang.
Accordingly, Victorian Police claimed they were being overrun and desperately needed a big boost in policing numbers to maintain law and order:
Victorian lives are at risk because police don’t have enough officers and are forced to juggle high priority jobs, their union says.
A Police Association survey of almost half the state’s frontline sergeants said they regularly did not have the frontline numbers to get to jobs.
A quarter said they are holding Priority 1 jobs (carjackings, aggravated burglaries, assaults) for more than an hour due to understaffing…
“That’s just not acceptable,” Police Association secretary Ron Iddles told reporters on Wednesday.
“We’re are at a crisis point.
Yesterday, the ABS released its Recorded Crime – Victims report, which confirmed that armed robberies and break-ins now occur more often in Victoria than anywhere else in the nation.
The below tables summarise the situation:
The increase in motor vehicle theft has been particularly sharp:
Melbourne’s population has ballooned by around 1 million people over the past 12 years, but police numbers have failed to keep up. And with it, crime levels have soared.
Moreover, the city’s population is projected to rise by 1,850 people a week (97,000 people per year) for the next 35 years. Thus, demand for public services like police, teachers and nurses, will continue to grow and the Victorian Government will have to continually increase staffing levels.
Thankfully, the Andrew’s Victorian Government announced late last year that it would recruit 2,700 extra police over the next four years.
Now all Melbournians need is a massive boost to infrastructure spending and other public services to cope with the population influx. Or alternatively, the Victorian Government could lobby Canberra to cut immigration.
My guess is that the State Government will instead let living standards gradually slide, just as has occurred over the past decade or so.
